Tagged: John Farrell

For this week’s post, I had planned on doing a piece on what spots on the roster were actually still undecided besides left field. I noticed on Twitter that an surprising number of people were posing questions to the likes of Sportsnet Radio’s Mike Wilner (@Wilnerness590) , and well known bloggers Tao of Stieb (@TaoofStieb) and Drunk Jays Fans (@drunkjaysfans) regarding the chances of certain players making the opening day roster. Questions such as:

What are the chances of Anthony Gose making the team in 2012?

Why don’t the Jays put Snider in centre and Thames in left?

I don’t see why the Jays don’t just move Escobar to second and play Hechevarria at short!

Can Snider or Thames play first base?

The first two questions to anyone who follows this team closely are quite easy to answer. Colby Rasmus is the Blue Jays’ centre fielder in 2012. Gose will be spending his 2012 in Vegas. Why people think Gose is a better option in centre having never played an inning in the majors is beyond me. Yes he’s fast and a plus defender but he’s at least a year away from being ready for the Show. Barring injury, you won’t see Gose playing for the Jays this summer. He’s a prime candidate for a September call-up but the Blue Jays have no need to rush him and remember that Colby Rasmus fellow???

The second question is also an emphatic NO!!! Again, this Colby Rasmus fellow who everybody was thrilled to see the Blue Jays acquire last season is the Blue Jays’ centrefielder. Yes both Eric and Travis are having fine springs but one of them is going to start the year in Las Vegas. It’s probably going to be Travis but I discussed that in my last post so I won’t go into any further detail as to why I think this to be the case.

As for the third statement, similar to Gose, the Blue Jays have no reason to rush Adeiny Hechevarria. From all accounts, Hechevarria is already an elite defender and major league ready with his glove. However, he is very much a work and progress at the dish. He’s improving at the plate and is apparently much stronger this spring then he was at the end of the season last year but he still needs time to develop. Again, the Blue Jays have a shortstop and second baseman in place for 2012; Yunel Escobar and Kelly Johnson.

Again for the fourth question, the answer is ‘NO’. It’s not that Snider and Thames can’t play first base it’s just that the Blue Jays have Adam Lind slated to play first. If that fails then you’ll see Edwin Encarnacion try his hand there and if E5 turns into E3 then you’ll likely see David Cooper get a shot. There is no chance the Blue Jays would throw Snider or Thames at first in 2012. It is conceivable I suppose that the Blue Jays might consider converting one of them to a first baseman in 2013 but I find that rather unlikely.

This brings me to the main subject of this post and that is who will be the Blue Jays fans’ whipping boy in 2012? In 2011, the Vernon Wells trade presented us Juan Rivera on a silver platter. His struggles at the plate and his total lack of speed did nothing to help Mr. Rivera’s cause and mercifully, the Blue Jays dealt him to the Dodgers in June. The fan’s ire then shifted fully to the back end of the Blue Jays bullpen where Jason Frasor, Jon Rauch and Frank Francisco drew heat for a multitude of late inning meltdowns.

Given the fan’s attention in Spring, I think it’s pretty clear that the prime candidates for whipping boy 2012 are, in no particular order: Colby Rasmus, Kelly Johnson and Adam Lind.

I don’t get why some fans have given up on Rasmus already. My best guess is that these are Blue Jays fans that watch the Blue Jays and only the Blue Jays and see Rasmus as a player with an attitude problem who only batted .173 with 3 homeruns as a Blue Jay. They don’t see the five-tool player with a huge upside who had an OPS (on-base plus slugging percentage) of .859 and 23 homeruns in 2010 as a 24 year old. In 2011, the kid got run out of St. Louis by Tony LaRussa who then proceeded to throw him under a bus after the trade to Toronto. He got to Toronto and then dealt with a wrist injury and only got in 35 games. Hardly time to give up on a player this young and with this much upside. That being said, if Rasmus gets off to a slow start, you’ll see fans calling for the Jays to play Snider or Gose in centre.

Kelly Johnson was another player who had a really rough 2011 season and has Blue Jays questioning whether he should be the team’s second baseman. However, given that the previous everyday second baseman for the Blue Jays who the Jays traded to get Johnson was having an equally bad 2011 (and a brutal 2010 for that matter), a change of scenery could bode well for both Johnson and Hill. Johnson is only signed to a one year deal so fans won’t resent him for his contract but again may be the target of fan’s ire simply because some fans don’t want to wait for Hechevarria.

Then there is Mr. Adam Lind. Lind had a great 2009 season. A breakout year for Mr. Lind. Then came 2010 where as the team’s DH, he struggled mightily with an OBP of a mere .287. Some writers pointed to the fact that he was a DH at such a young age and had to dwell all game over his failures at the plate as a reason for such a drop-off from 2010. The 2011 season was supposed to be a comeback season for Adam given that he was back to a full-time defensive player. Despite a promising start to the year, he again put up horrific numbers batting .251 and an on-base percentage of .295. He did put up 26 homeruns and 87 RBIs but given first base is generally a power position, these numbers don’t hold water. This kind of production is also not acceptable for a team’s #4 hitter who is supposed to provide protection to one of baseball’s premier power hitters in Jose Bautista. There is a reason why Bautista led the majors in walks last season. If you want to really put how bad Adam Lind’s numbers were in 2011, just look at his Wins Above Replacement of 0.7 and compare that with those players that played 50% of their games at 1B last season and had enough plate appearances to qualify for the batting title. He ranks 18 out of 20. To me, this is the guy who is going to be your whipping boy for 2012 Blue Jays fans. He’s had two consecutive bad seasons, he’s the player who is supposed to be providing protection for the Jays’ best hitter and he’s the guy who was quoted this spring as saying that he’s ‘not much of a workout guy’ and still doesn’t like it but now knows he has to work out and is willing to put in the twenty minutes a day he believes is necessary. Maybe he’ll return to his 2009 form but all signs are pointing to another rough season. I just hope that if he does struggle, John Farrell has enough sense to take him out of the lineup or at least move him down in the order.

The excitement over the start of Spring Training is still lingering but we really need some games to start. Pitchers and Catchers have reported, and now the position players are in camp. There are nice stories coming out on new contracts (Bautista), top prospects experiencing their first spring training (Hechevarria) or with the Blue Jays (Lawrie, Gose), John Farrell at the helm for his first Spring Training and players adapting to new roles and fighting for roster spots.

However the writers having skimmed the cream off the top with those early stories, are starting to dig for stories. Richard Griffin of the Toronto Star who was starting to actually write some positive stories about the Blue Jays instead of ranting about the previous G.M., the ownership and shifting t.v. broadcasts to other channels, ticket prices etc. etc. However, he’s back today complaining about how John Farrell handled the communication about the Travis Snider injury. Farrell noted that Snider had been held back from workouts due to tightness in his core area and denied it was anything serious. When questioned, Snider admitted he had a core-muscle strain from golfing last week and that was it. Griffin maintains that Farrell deflected the question about the injury. Now I think that’s digging a little deep here given a “tightness in the core area” and “strained core-muscle” are awfully similar in my opinion. If we were in a court of law then maybe we could break down the semantics of each statement and convict Farrell of being ‘secretive’ but we’re not here. You have two people speaking to the media and used slightly different language to describe what, is in effect, a minor nagging type of injury that should not affect Snider being ready for opening day. It’s not 2007 where the then GM for the Blue Jays admitted he lied to the media about a major elbow injury to B.J. Ryan. This is just a minor injury that doesn’t need much attention!!! However Richard Griffin basically has the attitude that if the Blue Jays don’t act in a manner consistent with the way the Montreal Expos acted when he was employed by them, then it’s completely wrong. Sorry, I’m ranting so much on Mr. Griffin but I find his “holier than thou” attitude and his need to look for problems/issues when there aren’t any very irritating.

Now onto a real injury story that may actually have an impact on the Blue Jays roster on Opening Day. Scott Posednik has re-aggravated the injury to his foot that kept him out of the last 20 or so games in 2010. He has plantar-fasciitis and that tends to be a nagging injury that is hard to treat and can be very painful. This is not good news given that Posednik is there to bring speed to the line-up. However, it’s not the end of the world given that Posednik was not slated at an opening day starter but rather as a fourth or fifth outfielder. They still have Corey Patterson in camp as well as Rajai Davis as their starting centre fielder so they can afford to wait on Posednik getting healthy. Perhaps they decide to not even take the risk and release Posednik before the start of the season (he’s only inked to a minor-league deal).